Dirty Family Secrets
by MadTom
Summary: After Jules is wounded at the end of "Between Heartbeats", she has to come clean to Sam and the rest of Team 1 about a family secret when her parents rush to her bedside. Oneshot.


DIRTY FAMILY SECRETS

A _Flashpoint_ fanfiction

by

Lyle Francis Padilla

(aka MadTom)

After Jules is wounded at the end of _Between Heartbeats_, she has to come clean to Sam and the rest of Team 1 about a family secret when her parents rush to her bedside. Oneshot.

* * *

"Ladies and gentlemen, I have an announcement to make!" the Deputy Chief called out to the police officers assembled in the briefing room of the small suburban police department, then waited for them to settle and silence. "Chief Callahan is on emergency family leave until further notice. Most of you have heard about the sniper incident in Toronto yesterday, one police officer dead, another officer and a security guard wounded. The wounded officer is Chief Callahan's daughter Julianna, who is in serious but stable condition. Chief and Mrs. Callahan are on their way to Toronto. Please keep the family in your prayers. Thank you."

The briefing room broke into loud murmurs.

"Poor Chief!"

"The Old Man finally shakes his reputation, retires from the City, then remarries and has... what? Four, five kids?"

"Five. Three of them on the job."

"Yeah. Isn't the daughter in Toronto the one who's on their SWAT team?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"And he comes out of retirement to come here so he can put his kids through college, then his youngest is about to graduate so he can really retire for good. Then his only daughter gets hurt on the job!"

"Anyone hear what happened to the shooter?"

"Dead at the scene. I presume the rest of their SWAT team got him."

"He gets off lucky, then. Can you imagine the Old Man getting to Toronto and deciding to go after the shooter?" That line triggered a roar of laughter from everyone.

"Nah! That was ages ago. Cut the Old Man some slack!"

* * *

"You know, Spike," Mrs. Callahan said, "you're the first teammate of Jules that her dad and I have ever met."

"I kinda figured that," Officer Spike Scarlatti glanced back over his shoulder at her before easing the black Chevy Suburban SRU vehicle onto the freeway on-ramp from Pearson Airport. "I'm sorry we had to meet under such distressing circumstances."

"That's all right. And Jules tells us just about everything about all of you, so I feel like we know you all. She just never brought us to the station when we visited her before. The same when she was with the RCMP." Mrs. Callaghan struck Spike as relatively calm and cheerful considering the situation. She looked and acted youthful, barely old enough to be Jules's mother, and was slender like her daughter. Her husband, on the other hand, sitting up front next to him, was much older, tall, lean and nearly white-haired with craggy facial features. His handshake at baggage claim had been firm and friendly enough, but he'd barely said a word after the introductions.

"So, Chief Callaghan," Spike said, "do you and Jules talk shop much?"

"A little. I gather she doesn't like to advertise the fact that she's a third generation cop." His voice was mellow and soft, but something about it told Spike it could be very menacing when he wanted it to be.

"She's mentioned it," Spike said, "but no, not flashed it around."

There were several seconds of silence before Chief Callahan sighed. "So you were at the scene when it happened, Officer Scarlatti?"

"I was in the vicinity, but I wasn't actually with Jules when she was wounded."

"So I presume you attended the debrief?"

"Yes, sir," Spike replied.

"So who was this bastard who shot her?"

"Sir, I'd rather let the Boss... Sergeant Parker... give you and Mrs. Callaghan all the details. If you don't mind, sir."

"Sure. I understand."

* * *

Greg Parker looked up from his seat in the hospital solarium to see Spike step out of the elevator with a couple who appeared several decades apart in age. As they approached him, he extended his hand.

"Chief and Mrs. Callaghan," Spike announced, "this is Sergeant Greg Parker, Jules's and my Team Leader. Boss, this is Chief and Mrs. Callaghan, Jules's parents."

"Call me Samantha," Mrs. Callahan told him.

Greg exchanged handshakes with the couple. "Sir, Ma'am, I wish I were meeting you under happier circumstances." Then he did a double take. "And I'm sorry. I didn't realize you were a chief. Jules's next-of-kin data listed you as a retired sergeant, and you didn't say anything when I addressed you over the phone as 'Sergeant' yesterday."

"We _haven't_ spoken over the phone," Chief Callahan said with a thin smile. "If you spoke to a Sergeant Callahan in Alberta yesterday, that would be my kid brother Dennis." He looked at Greg's puzzled face and added, "Jules lists him as her next-of-kin because he's her closest relative here in Canada."

"So you _don't_ live in Canada?" Greg raised his eyebrows. "I was wondering why your flight was coming in from Minneapolis."

Chief Callahan didn't answer directly, and instead stated, "We called the Information Desk here as soon as the pilot told us it was OK to turn our cell phones back on. Anything change in the last twenty-five minutes?"

"Well," Greg replied. "I don't know if the Information Desk told you, but she's been awake a little over an hour. The doctor's in there looking at her right now."

"That's good to hear!" Samantha Callahan sighed heavily and embraced her husband, who let his own tension drain out of his body.

"So, Sergeant Parker, are you feeling up to telling us what happened, and what you know about the sonofabitch who hurt our little girl?"

"Sure, have a seat," Greg nodded with a deep breath, then waited for the couple and Spike to sit down before seating himself next to the Callaghans. "The shooter was a twenty-six year old man named Petar Tomasic. He was a very troubled man by the time this shooting incident started. It really began about a year ago. Tomasic, his father Goran and his stepmother Marta were all Croatian immigrants. Goran and Marta had separated because he was physically abusive, and then he shot her fatally in the lobby of the office building where she was part of the janitorial crew, on a busy workday. Then he took an innocent female bystander hostage and took her out into the plaza of the office complex. There was a long standoff, aggravated by the fact that Goran's English was limited and it took us time to find a Croatian translator. Goran had continued to escalate and threaten the hostage. Interestingly, I'd initially given Jules the duty of lead sniper, but she didn't have a good angle from her position on a rooftop, so she passed the lead to our team tactical leader, Officer Ed Lane who was on another rooftop. Officer Lane had the solution, but we continued to try to negotiate. About forty minutes into the standoff, Petar Tomasic arrived on the scene and started to call out to his father from outside the cordon. But that only escalated the father, who appeared to be about to actually shoot the hostage. I gave Officer Lane the codeword for being cleared to fire, and at the same time, Petar broke through the cordon of uniformed officers and rushed toward the hostage scene. Officer Lane shot and killed Goran Tomasic just as his son reached him. The hostage was physically unharmed. It was a good shoot. The investigation validated our actions completely."

The Callahans took a couple of seconds to digest the information. "But the son held a grudge against your team," Chief Callahan said knowingly.

Greg nodded. "Especially against Ed Lane. Petar Tomasic became obsessed with the idea that he could have talked his father down. He sued the city, the department, and Ed as an individual for wrongful death, and got a summary dismissal in court. Then yesterday morning we started getting sniper shots at selected people in the vicinity of City Hall. Have you ever been to that part of the city?"

"Yes," Samantha replied. "Jules took us there on a few of our earlier visits."

"So you can imagine what a nightmare that area can be in terms of locating a sniper's perch," Greg looked at Chief Callaghan. "Lots of tall buildings with plenty of concealment from ground level, an acoustic echo chamber, especially the curved walls of City Hall itself. The first shot wounded a City Hall security guard in the leg, then the next several were at two minute intervals, and were near-misses. When we arrived on scene, we put up an acoustic locator, and it took a direct hit. That told us that the near misses were intentional. As we started profiling the shooter, Officer Lane mentioned that his son had told him he'd been accosted earlier by someone fitting Tomasic's description. Then a friend of Petar Tomasic arrived on scene and told us that Tomasic had phoned him earlier with a goodbye message. Then he revealed that Tomasic had been a guerrilla sniper in Croatia as a young teenager. So the friend called Tomasic's cell number and he actually answered. He demanded we hand over Officer Lane to him, and when we refused, Tomasic fatally shot a rookie uniform officer who was part of our cordon."

The couple looked at each other. "Sound familiar?" Chief Callahan asked his wife.

"Too familiar," Samantha Callahan replied.

"But by getting him on the cell phone we were able to pinpoint him," Greg continued. "We sent Jules and Officer Sam Braddock, another sniper, to get him. Unfortunately, Tomasic kept one step ahead of us the first two times, with a new sniper's nest in another building. That's how Jules was hit. She and Sam thought they'd actually spotted him lying prone on a rooftop, but when they checked out the position which was relatively exposed, it turned out to be a pile of clothes and a metal pipe laid out as a decoy, and she was shot once through the chest."

"And she was wearing a Kevlar vest?" Chief Callahan asked.

"Yes, sir," Greg nodded. "The same type our Forces are issued in combat. Tomasic had an H&K G-3 with AP rounds. It went through her and both layers of Kevlar."

Samantha stifled a sob, while her husband let a wince show through his general stoicism.

"Officer Braddock went out under fire and dragged her to cover," Greg continued. "As paramedics and more team members came to take Jules to an ambulance and back up Braddock, Tomasic kept shooting and we located him firing from the maintenance floor at the top of City Hall. We found out he was wearing a fake SRU uniform and that's how he'd gotten from building to building. Once Jules was on the ambulance, Sam went back to his rooftop while the rest of the team converged on the top floor of City Hall. Unfortunately, Ed Lane was in the lead, and Tomasic got the jump on him in a stairwell and held him hostage when the rest of the team got to them. But Sam was still on the other rooftop, and Ed managed to walk Tomasic into his line of fire. Officer Braddock neutralized the Subject."

"Dead at the scene?" Chief Callahan asked.

"Yes, sir."

"And you're sure he wasn't part of some terror cell that's still out there?"

"Everything points to a one man vendetta against the SRU and Ed Lane and not to terrorism or any conspiracy. The nonlethal wounding of the first victim, all the near-misses, then the fatal shooting of the uniformed officer when we refused to turn Ed over to them. His biological mother had died in the war, his father and stepmother were his only remaining family. Luka Boblic, the young man who came forward, was his only friend left, and _he_ approached _us_, and did everything he could to help us talk Tomasic down. When Tomasic had Ed Lane hostage, all he ranted about was how Ed's son was going to suffer the same grief he did. Absolutely nothing that indicated political terrorism."

The Callahans sat silently, absorbing the information. "Thank you, Sergeant," Chief Callahan said finally.

"Yes, thank you," Samantha Callahan echoed. "You've spared us from a lot more distress than we're already going through." She turned to her husband with a soft smile and stroked his forearm. "You're way too old for your own vendetta, and you're way out of your jurisdiction. Plus you would've sparked an international incident!"

Chief Callahan laughed softly and then took his wife in an embrace. "I'm not quite to the point of chasing killers with a walker, but you're right."

There was a short pause before Greg asked,"So if Jules's uncle is her closest relative in Canada, then she didn't grow up in Medicine Hat, Alberta?"

"Not exactly," Chief Callahan said. "My brother was with the Austin, Texas PD, then retired to Alberta because his wife-" He heard footsteps come up behind him and saw Greg look up at the person behind him.

"Excuse me, Chief Callaghan," Greg said as he rose up. "Doctor, these are Jules's parents. They just got here a few minutes ago."

The couple rose and turned to face a young, diminutive swarthy man in a white coat. "Mr. and Mrs. Callaghan, I'm Dr. Prakash, Julianna's attending physician." There was an exchange of handshakes, and he said to Samantha, "I believe I spoke to you before you left for the airport, Mrs. Callaghan." Samantha nodded in confirmation.

"Julianna's in much better shape than when she came in yesterday. Her vital signs are all improving and almost back to normal. Her fever's down to 38.5 centigrade and no further signs of infection so far, but we have to keep an eye out for them and keep her on antibiotics as a preventative measure. And the lung injury is, of course, our biggest concern, so we're keeping her on oxygen until her saturation level is within normal limits. I've just upgraded her condition from fair to good. She just needs time to heal." He smiled to Greg. "She won't be rappelling down skyscrapers or kicking down doors for a few months."

"As long as she will eventually," Greg said.

"We've returned other police officers to full duty after far worse injuries," Dr. Prakash nodded. "Believe me. Including an Officer Perkin, whom I believe is in your SRU."

"He's _Sergeant_ Perkin, leader of Team Five now," Greg replied.

"There you go," Dr. Prakash said, then turned to the Callaghans. "But I'm sure you're anxious to see your daughter right away, Mum and Dad. She's in Room 327." He gestured down the hall.

The couple found their daughter lying with the head of her bed propped up, an IV tube inserted into her left arm and a nasal cannula connecting her to an oxygen regulator. She looked pale and weak but awake, holding hands with a handsome well-built man about her age with short blond hair and about a day's growth of beard, sitting at her bedside. He wore a dark blue pocket T-shirt and jeans. Both of them looked haggard. Upon hearing the Callahans enter, she turned her head and the blond man stood up.

"Hi, Sweetheart!" Samantha smiled, she and her husband blinking back tears. "We're here!"

"Mommy! Daddy!" Julianna Callaghan whispered as she started weeping. Her mother moved forward and gave her a gentle hug and kiss, careful of the tubes and the area on her torso where she knew the injuries and bandages would be.

They both sobbed softly, and then as Samantha moved aside to let her husband embrace their daughter, she turned to the blond man. "You must be Sam."

"Yes, ma'am."

She gave him a quick hug. "I'm Jules's mom. Call me Samantha. This is her father Harold."

Her husband gave their daughter a kiss and then stood up and turned to shake Sam's hand, patting his shoulder with his other hand. "Sam, your team leader tells us you saved our little girl's life. _And_ killed the sonofabitch who did this. Thanks. We owe you."

"I just wish I could've prevented this, sir," Sam said, his voice shaky, as he looked tearfully toward Jules.

"Your team leader also said your subject was an experienced guerrilla sniper from the Serbo-Croatian War. _Nobody_ expects to run into one of those in Toronto, Ontario!"

"But I should've handled it. I'm an experienced combat sniper too. I did two tours in Afghanistan..."

"And you got the bastard!" Chief Callahan slapped Sam's shoulder again. "And you saved our Jules. That alone makes you a hero in our book."

"Thank you, sir. That means a lot." Sam cast his eyes downward a few seconds. "I'll leave you three alone. They try to limit the visitors to two at a time." He leaned over and kissed Jules softly on the forehead.

"Don't go far," she smiled at him.

"I won't."

Chief Callahan waited for his daughter's boyfriend to disappear into the hallway before telling her, "Seems like a good man."

"He is, Daddy. I love him," Jules smiled, and then her lips quivered and she started weeping again.

"Does your sergeant know that?" her father smiled wryly.

"I think so. And he's been looking the other way."

"Oh, and Uncle Denny, Aunt Moira and Maeve will all be here tonight," he added. "Funny how they have only two thirds as far to travel as we did, but you know yourself how you have to catch some crazy connections to fly from Ass-Hat, Alberta to anywhere populated!"

"They didn't have to drop everything to..." Jules suddenly sobbed as loudly as her injuries allowed her. "Mommy! Daddy! I'm so sorry!"

"Sorry for what, Sweetheart?" Samantha sobbed in answer as they hugged each other.

"I screwed up. I got shot."

"But you're alive!" her father reassured her. "Like I just told your boyfriend, you were up against an experienced guerrilla sniper with 7.62 AP rounds. You're alive and he's dead. Tommy prays for an outcome like that for himself and his troops, every day he spends deployed. So will Kelly when it's his turn. You got through it!"

"Dr. Prakash just told us you just need time to heal," her mother added.

"This time," Jules sniffled.

"If you want to quit your SWAT Team-" her father started.

"Strategic Response Unit," Jules corrected him.

"SRU, SWAT, whatever. You want to quit, that's up to you and I'll understand. I won't think any less of you. But you're alive for a reason. It wasn't your time. Like my old Gunny Sergeant told me after my first firefight in 'Nam: 'If your time's up, I don't care how fast you run or how well you duck!'" He laughed, "Plus, you could just as easily get sideswiped by a bus writing out a parking ticket!"

Jules laughed.

"We're proud of you, Sweetheart," her mother said. "Whatever you decide, we're proud of you."

"One thing I _have_ decided today," Jules replied, "I'm going to change my name back!"

"Hey!" Chief Callahan looked at her. "That whole name thing was _my_ idea, remember? You're just the only one who took it seriously!"

"It makes it look like I'm ashamed of you, Daddy."

Chief Callahan laughed and kissed her forehead. "What are you, kidding me? The letter G may be your lucky charm! It may be the reason you're still alive!"

* * *

Chief Callahan left his wife and daughter in the room and returned to the solarium where Sam, Spike and Greg were sitting together. He nodded to Sam. "You can go back and see her."

"Thank you, sir," Sam nodded back.

He stepped back down the hall to Jules's room. She immediately saw the puzzled frown on his face. "Something wrong, Sam?"

"The Boss just told me something odd that your dad told him." He shot a glance at Samantha for confirmation. "Your husband says the two of you don't live in Alberta or anywhere in Canada."

The two women chuckled. "That's right, Sam," Samantha smiled. "We're Americans."

"I'm a dual citizen," Jules added. "Sam, I've got to come clean about a few things. Especially what I told you about my family just before I got shot." She laughed, then winced from the chest pains from it. "I guess that shot was a bolt of lightning from God warning me to tell the whole truth. It sure felt like it, anyway."

Sam laughed along. "I'm listening."

"What I told you about my family... The cop in my family who was at the tower shooting, then retired to the ranch in Alberta... that wasn't my dad I was talking about. That was my Uncle Denny."

"The Boss told me that part," Sam nodded. "So _you_ didn't grow up on a ranch in Alberta?"

"Not really. Went to college in Alberta because I was close to Uncle Denny and his wife and daughters. He's a dual citizen, too. Along with my cousins."

"Makes sense if your parents are American and your uncle was at the clock tower shooting. So you don't really have four brothers?"

"Ohhh, I sure do!" Jules smiled. "I'm the second of the five of us. And two of my brothers are on the job too, and the other two are in the Marine Corps. Hal, my older brother, is an FBI field agent in Jacksonville, Florida, then there's me, then Tommy, who's a Marine infantry major at Camp LeJeune, North Carolina, just finished his third tour in Afghanistan, then Billy, who's a homicide detective in the California Highway Patrol, and the youngest is Kelly, who's in his last year of college and Navy ROTC at Stanford and about to become a Marine second lieutenant."

Sam turned to Samantha. "Are you a cop too, Mrs. Callaghan? Or a Marine officer?"

Samantha laughed. "No, I'm a TV reporter. But I did meet Jules's father while covering a serial killer investigation he was on. Then when Har- uh, Harold got close to cracking the case, he and I both became targets of the killer and he ended up saving my life. Kind of romantic when you think about it!"

"Wow!"

"And another confession, Sam," Jules said. "My last name wasn't always spelled the way it is."

"Really!" Sam raised his eyebrows. "But it _was_ always pronounced Callaghan, though. Right?"

* * *

Chief Callahan took Sam's vacated seat. After a pregnant pause, he turned to Greg. "My wife and I are feeling a lot better about everything. Not just her physical and emotional recovery, but her future with your team, now that we've met all of you face to face, Sergeant Parker."

"Thank you, Chief. And please call me Greg."

"All right, Greg. And since I'm out of my jurisdiction and you're my daughters' teammates, my first name is Harold."

"Ok. I can assure you, Harold, that if Jules has good things to say about the Strategic Response Unit and Team One, it's not biased."

"Oh, believe me, I know!" Chief Callahan cracked his wry smile, "Just because my department may not be a very big one, doesn't mean I don't have the connections and independent access to the performance of other police agencies. Even in a big city in a neighboring country, like Toronto." He added with a laugh, "Christ, I didn't think there was as much violent crime in all of Canada as your team seems to run into!"

Greg stifled his own laugh, then decided to change the subject. "So, as I was asking earlier, if Jules's uncle is her closest relative in Canada, then she didn't grow up in Medicine Hat, Alberta, right?"

"And, as I was about to tell you," Chief Callahan said, "my brother was with the Austin, Texas PD, then retired to Medicine Hat because that's where his wife's from. He's got three daughters, all within a couple of years of Jules's age, and Jules is our only girl, so she got close to them and always loved it when we visited them. She decided to go to college in Alberta, then became a Canadian citizen after she graduated. That's when she changed the spelling of her last name."

"Was that an act of rebellion against the family?"

"Nope," Chief Callahan laughed. "It's been a family joke for generations, talking about putting the G back in the name ever since some semi-literate clerk on Ellis Island misspelled it on my great-grandparents' immigration papers. But all three of my kids that are on the job, I even encouraged them to think about it so they wouldn't have my reputation follow them around. Jules was the only one to take it seriously and actually do it, and only because her change of citizenship made it easy."

"Your brother was in the Austin PD?" Greg furrowed his brows. "My ex-wife and son live in Dallas. You don't sound like a Texan. And neither did your brother over the phone."

"Denny was a cop in the US Air Force, his wife was a communications specialist in _your_ Air Force, they met when they were both at NORAD Headquarters. Then he was stationed in Austin when his enlistment expired, so that's how he ended up on the job there. But we Callahans have been Californians for four generations."

"So what department were _you_ the chief of?"

"Winifred, California. Still am, at least until Jules's youngest brother graduates from college next May."

"Is that where Jules and her brothers grew up?"

"Yep. Nice quiet suburban town. Nothing like the City, where Denny and our sisters and I grew up."

"Winifred, California," Greg squinted. "Doesn't ring any bells. Where is it?"

"Out in wine country, about halfway between the Bay Area and Sacramento."

Greg started laughing softly. "Bay Area. That explains it!"

"Explains what?"

"Our code word authorizing a sniper to use deadly force is 'Scorpio'."

A slight grin flashed across Chief Callahan's face. "Is it, now?"

"When Jules started out in the SRU, she kept asking if it was a reference to the San Francisco serial killer in the early '70s," Greg continued to chuckle.

"So is it?" Chief Callahan smiled enigmatically.

"Nobody ever told me," Greg shrugged. "I told her it was probably just an Urban Legend. That I always figured it was in reference to a scorpion giving its prey one quick and lethal sting. She kept trying to research it. She was obsessed with it for a while."

"That's my girl!" Chief Callahan laughed.

"After that went on for a couple of weeks, I finally told her, if it did have anything to do with the Scorpio Killer, it was probably an homage to the San Francisco cop who shot him. From what I read about the case, Scorpio had a ten year old boy hostage, using him as a shield with a 9 millimeter to his head." Greg paused. "That's about as bad as a deadly force hostage situation can get."

Chief Callahan maintained his enigmatic smile. "As best as I can recall, the cop didn't go for a lethal shot at first. He went for a shoulder shot that knocked Scorpio flat on his back, and the hostage kid got away. Then Scorpio apparently felt lucky and took a gamble that the cop was out of ammo, and picked his 9 millimeter back up. He _wasn't_ lucky." He paused, then added, "If the cop had been packing anything smaller than a Smith & Wesson Model 29, that shoulder shot might not have knocked him flat. Would've had to go for a head shot in the first place."

Greg chuckled again. "I never read anything _that_ detailed about the Scorpio Killer case. I guess being from right in the Bay Area, you had access to more detai-" The veteran hostage negotiator and SWAT leader froze and turned pale. "Oh, Jesus! Harold Callahan... Callahan without a G... You're _that_ Callahan! The Wyatt Earp of San Francisco!"

"That's one of my _Nom de Guerre_s," he laughed as he slapped Greg on the shoulder. "I prefer Dirty Harry myself!"

* * *

They stayed in Toronto until their daughter was out of the hospital and back on her feet. She was well enough to accompany them as Sam drove them back to Pearson Airport. There was a tearful exchange of hugs all around, with Jules promising to come home to Winifred as soon as she was cleared to fly, and Harry and Samantha promising to come back to Toronto and visit more often. Once the Callahans were past security and headed down the concourse to their gate, Harry turned to his wife.

"I like Sam..." he said, "as a cop! Maybe even as a boyfriend. I'm still not sure yet about him being son-in-law material, but he beats the hell out of any of the punks I remember Jules dating in high school! I definitely like him as a cop."

Samantha laughed. "Well, let's see... He's ruggedly handsome, he's a war veteran, he's got a reputation as being a little trigger-happy-"

"An _undeserved_ reputation as being trigger-happy!"

"Or so he claims!" Samantha nodded. "He's insubordinate when he thinks he's right. He practically spends his entire career blowing the brains out of people who are using hostages as human shields. He's had a partner shot right next to him, but he's also saved the life of the woman he loves. What's not to love about Sam Braddock?"

"Oh, God!" Harry rolled his eyes. "Is this going to be one of those discussions about Freud, and how all girls want to marry their fathers?"

"If the shoe fits, Callahan!" Samantha laughed.

THE END

* * *

**Author's Notes:**

**Hopefully sometime before the ending, you the reader realized that I wasn't careless, sloppy or arbitrary with the two spellings of Jules's family's surname. If you still think I was, feel free to scroll back up and reread the whole story and you'll see that the spelling depends on who is speaking the dialogue or whose point of view is being presented, and whether that character is aware of the difference in spellings. I took a lot of pains to do that.**

**And also, I hope all readers enjoyed this story whether they're fans of the _Flashpoint_ TV series, or the series of _Dirty Harry_ movies, or both. As there was a twenty year gap between _The Dead Pool_, the last of the _Dirty Harry_ movies, and the premiere episode of _Flashpoint_, I suspect that the percentage making up the "both" category is relatively small. I intentionally bent over backwards to refer to Dirty Harry Callahan as "Chief Callahan" or "Harold", and did NOT post this as a crossover fanfic, to keep from spoiling the story for those fans of both who find this under the _Flashpoint_ category rather than through the _Dirty Harry_ category and my Author's Page. (I did, however, leave a trail of breadcrumbs for you: Jules's older brother Hal is presumed to be named Harold Francis Callahan Jr., and their brothers' first names are those of other Clint Eastwood characters similar to Dirty Harry. And yes, Mrs. Samantha Callahan is Samantha Walker from _The Dead Pool_, and I didn't feel a need to spell it out any further than I did.)**

**I have just never been able to watch an episode of _Flashpoint_ and hear people referring to "Officer Callaghan" or "Jules Callaghan" and not think of another fictional cop with a homonymic surname who also spent a great deal of time shooting some pretty bad-assed villains, many of them using hostages as human shields. It was only a matter of reconciling the two spellings of the name and the canons of the two universes. I hope I've done a credible job of that, and hope you enjoyed it!**

**As always, feedback is invited.**


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